Emissaries to the Church

We are asking you as home teachers to be God’s emissaries to His children, to love and care and pray for the people you are assigned.

Not long ago a single sister, whom I will call Molly, came home from work only to find two inches (5 cm) of water covering her entire basement floor. Immediately she realized that her neighbors, with whom she shared drainage lines, must have done an inordinate amount of laundry and bathing because she got the backed-up water.

After Molly called a friend to come and help, the two began bailing and mopping. Just then the doorbell rang. Her friend cried out, “It’s your home teachers!”

Molly laughed. “It is the last day of the month,” she replied, “but I can assure you it is not my home teachers.”

With bare feet, wet trousers, hair up in a bandana, and a very fashionable pair of latex gloves, Molly made her way to the door. But her stark appearance did not compare with the stark sight standing before her eyes. Itwas her home teachers!

“You could have knocked me over with a plumber’s friend!” she later told me. “This was a home teaching miracle—the kind the Brethren share in general conference talks!” She went on: “But just as I was trying to decide whether to give them a kiss or hand them a mop, they said, ‘Oh, Molly, we are sorry. We can see you are busy. We don’t want to intrude; we’ll come another time.’ And they were gone.”

“Who was it?” her friend called out from the basement.

“I wanted to say, ‘It certainly wasn’t the Three Nephites,’” Molly admitted, “but I restrained myself and said very calmly, ‘It was my home teachers, but they felt this was not an opportune time to leave their message.’”1